Per Manibus Solis
by McGrizzle
Summary: A short fic requested by my dear friend MockingVenus. I'm a little rusty, excuse me if it's bad.


There were few problems he couldn't solve with his hands.

Metal mechanisms once so meticulously crafted and combined littered the ground. The castle shook with each forward lunge he took, obliterating his own handiwork with blows of equal parts precision and power. Normally, he would only activate four or five at a time. This time, however, he had set a grand total of ten upon himself. Mere impulse would cause that day's events.

There were very few problems he couldn't solve with his hands.

Six robot fighters, once bustling with energy, were now blown to bits around the room. The remaining four advanced on their creator, determined to execute that program which they were made to, at the cost of their fleeting lives. The creator himself was ready, with his back to the wall, to dismantle even these four, with his former opponents decorating the arena.

Two of the robots suddenly advanced, flying through the air with no expression besides a crimson shine in the glass orbs that served as their eyes. Not missing a beat, the bold inventor swung his arms in a wide arc over his head, catching the robots mid-flight. Then, time seems to slow down. The boy realizes something is pushing back against his hands as he smashes his toys to the ground. He comprehends, as his body his lifted from the ground, that two machines exploding at the same time in such close proximity would easily be enough to blast him through the wall. His arms flailed about helplessly as he descended outside his hive, his prideful strength failing him at every step.

Equius couldn't solve this problem with his hands.

Was he really going to die like this, in a freak accident resulting from his freak strength? The irony of this continuity hit him just as a thick beam of white iron caught him in the back, braking his fall immediately. But what was this doing here? And why was it so sticky? It was then that he noticed he was surrounded by these thick beams- no, _strands._ He was caught in a spider's web.

He couldn't solve this problem with his hands, either.

Nevertheless, his first reaction was to writhe in anger, shaking both his hive and the cliff adjacent to it. Sweat poured down his frame, outlining his sinewy limbs in their efforts to free him. The rumbling alerted a certain large lusus that dinner was coming early tonight. He put more effort into it now, shaking loose rubble from both cliffs, determined not to die as the meal of some vile beast. The lusus was still making its merry way to the catch when a voice floated down to his ears, giving him a sense of dread and hope at the same time.

"Who the hell is dum8 enough to get caught in a we8 in a canyon?!" The voice mocked him. He deigned it unnecessary to reply and instead focused on the life-or-death task at hand. Undaunted, the voice continued. "Does your thinkpan work, kid? Pro8a8ly not, seeing as you're down there in the first place!" This is unnecessary, he said to no one in particular. Maybe she'll just let him die in pe- "You're about the weakest one I've seen yet!"

He was going to solve this problem with his hands.

"I would ask that you watch where you step, girl, before your foot slips and winds up in your mouth." She gave a condescending laugh, asserting that she wouldn't heed his advice.

"How a8out we make a deal, then? If you're not weak, why don't you get yourself out of that we8? Do that, and you're free to go!" She chuckled to herself, obviously enjoying the captive audience. "Aren't I 8enevolent?" He rolled his eyes. What a loaded game.

"Challenge a%epted."

For him.

The sweat he had been emitting up to this point now freed his arm just enough to reach down to his belt and flip a switch, from KILL to ASSIST. Fast as lightning, two robots dropped down from his hive and into the web, prying the indigo-blood from his near-doom. With a power belying his large frame, trained muscles catapulted him past the now-trapped robots, past the rows of webbing and their disappointed custodian, and over the tons of stone mass, directly in front of his now stunned ridiculer. Now he had his first glimpse of her; long, unkempt hair and bright red shoes were the first things to catch his attention. Then her lips, painted an inviting cobalt, betrayed her position on the blood caste- directly below him. She was his neighbor, the owner of the castle he saw across the chasm so frequently. He didn't think they'd meet in such a situation, or really at all. Had she been-

It was her hand testing his arm that pulled him from his thoughts, and only then did he realize he had been staring blankly at her lips for some time.

"That was… Quite impressive, kid…" He noticed her wiping the retracted arm on her pants, and the denotation of his sweat only furthered his flustered state.

"Yes, feats such as this are common to one of my unnatural STRENGTH." He choked on the last word awkwardly, something he always did and never meant to. She laughed for the second time, a lovely sound that echoed in his ears.

"You're weird, kid! I like you." She grabbed his hand and led him into her hive, tugging him along as if were leading a horse. He stumbled after her, vaguely aware of the tingling sensation spreading through his arm. He tried to tug his hand away, but something dampened his strength, made him unable to respond to her leading. Sweat formed in his hand, and she simply gripped him tighter. He shuddered.

He could not solve this problem with his hands.


End file.
